


While We Raise Our Hearts in Love

by Rubynye



Category: Lord of the Rings - Tolkien
Genre: Holidays, Multi, Nonmonogamy, Singing, The Shire, Threesome - F/M/M, Winter Solstice, Yule
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-14
Updated: 2010-01-14
Packaged: 2017-10-06 07:07:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/51018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubynye/pseuds/Rubynye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the first Yule after the Year of Troubles, and three hobbits have a special celebration planned.</p>
            </blockquote>





	While We Raise Our Hearts in Love

**Author's Note:**

> This story is an inset for ["The Rose and the Book"](http://www.livejournal.com/users/rubynye/19072.html), and a sequel to ["Festival Dancing"](http://www.livejournal.com/users/rubynye/809.html), but you don't need to have read either story to understand this. For the carols, please see the end.

Title: While We Raise Our Hearts in Love  
Challenge: [](http://community.livejournal.com/hobbit_smut/profile)[**hobbit_smut**](http://community.livejournal.com/hobbit_smut/) "Beneath the Mistletoe" Challenge  
Word Count: 5010  
Rating: NC-17  
Pairing: Frodo/Sam/Rosie  
Warnings: slash, het, threesome, schmoop  
Summary: It's the first Yule after the Year of Troubles, and three hobbits have a special celebration planned.   
Author's notes: This story is an inset for ["The Rose and the Book"](http://www.livejournal.com/users/rubynye/19072.html), and a sequel to ["Festival Dancing"](http://www.livejournal.com/users/rubynye/809.html), but you don't need to have read either story to understand this. For the carols, please see the end.

 

"_Tie the ribbons round the candles, let them brightly burn;  
Fill hole and hearth and heart with light on t'eve of Sunreturn._"

The hobbits sang together, filling the Town Hall to the rafters with joyful voices; Rosie sang from where she stood waiting by a side door, looking out over the crowd and thrumming with anticipation. It was Yule, and good cheer such as none of them had expected till perhaps a bare week before. Swept and polished, filled with lamps and candles, hung with wreaths and shining with happy faces, the Town Hall no longer showed it had lain chained shut and empty for a year; thanks to the discovery of several caches of beer and goods, the casks were full and the tables covered in food. On the musicians' dais the Redsmith brothers, recovered from their stays in the Lockholes, accompanied the Yule singing, smiles shining as they played. It was a bright and merry Yule, and Rosie smudged away a happy tear as she thought of the last one, of the dark year now over; she sang with everyone till she couldn't hear her own voice for all of theirs pouring into her ears and out from her throat. It was Yule, and her Sam had come back, and Mr. Frodo had come back, and the next year would be far better than this last.

Rosie felt Sam beside her even before he touched her elbow; he was soberly dressed, especially for Yule, but his fine grey cloak and the shine in his eyes were more ornament than the brightest clothing. Smiling up at him, Rosie tilted her head back onto his shoulder; her eyelids drooped and her blood quickened as his hand slipped slowly around the curve of her waist, very nearly as warm as if bodice and blouse and chemise didn't lie between his touch and her tingling skin.

Sam's other hand skimmed up over her cheek and ear to touch the ribbons in her hair, crimson velvet embroidered with gold thread, the ribbons he'd brought her from his travels; he stroked further, into her curls, and she tilted her head further, hoping Sam would kiss her. But he just smiled, candlelight twinkling in his eyes, and let go of her to take her hand and lead her from the song-filled Hall.

Even so, his hand trembled around hers, and he _did_ kiss her after they slipped through the mistletoe-hung doorway, his hands warm on her back even through her cloak, his mouth warmly familiar. Something shuddered loose, and he gave a tiny moan and kissed her harder, pulling her in more tightly, warmth shading to heat that crackled down her spine beneath his pressing hands. Rosie barely felt herself rising up on her toes as Sam's lips parted over hers and their tongues touched, then danced, then frankly twined. She barely felt her feet leave the ground as Sam lifted her, tilting back against the door to rest her on his chest and hitch her higher, till her face tilted down to his as he ravished her mouth, one hand sliding down her back---

Rosie realized that she was about to wind her legs round Sam's waist, and he was curving a hand beneath her thigh to help her, and what a picture they must make for anyone watching; the thought made her gasp a giggle into the kiss. Sam startled a little, his hold loosening, and Rosie pulled her head back, took a deep breath of chill air, and laughed aloud. "Sam, you're hot tonight!" she exclaimed, and his eyes flew open as his cheeks turned bright red. "I, well, I beg your pardon, Rosie," he stammered, setting her down gently. "I just, you look---"

Rosie laid two fingers over his mouth. "And you look fine yourself, Sam, fine and eager, and I like it. But Mr. Frodo's awaiting us someplace better than the back wall of Bywater Hall, I'm thinking?" She winked, and Sam blushed harder as he nodded, his arm winding wonderfully tight round her waist.

 

****

 

"_There is a Tree grown mighty, from out a bleak gap sprung,  
Of kind and form most wondrous, as those of old have sung.  
From highest heaven unfurled,   
Rooted in deepest lifesprings: foundation of the World. _"

Hand in warm hand, Sam and Rosie walked singing through the clear Yule night. Little white clouds of their breath glimmered in the moonlight and starlight; the beat of the singing and the eagerness of her heart made Rosie so light she barely felt the chill ground beneath her feet. She had missed the festivals with Sam and Mr. Frodo, she had, the warm and private little world the three of them held between them.

Sam led Rosie along the outskirts of the town to the rebuilt Clary Row, where nearly-finished holes stood empty and dark but for the smallest one on the end, which showed a golden glow in its window and a spray of pine bound with red ribbon hung on its door. Climbing the bank, Rosie turned her head to tilt it at Sam, whose smile was somewhere between naughty and shy as he looked through his lashes at her. "Marmadas Moss thought I mightn't spend Yule night in Hobbiton, for some reason or other."

Rosie laughed at that, twining their fingers; evidently she was heard, because the door opened, and there stood Mr. Frodo, dark before the firelight, gold glints in his night-blue eyes.

Rosie stopped laughing, her mouth going dry; she had somehow forgotten how fair Mr. Frodo could look. He almost shone pale as silver within the golden firelight, warm highlights in his dark hair. Beside her, Sam sucked in his breath; when Rosie glanced at him they smiled, knowing they shared the same thought, and her heart beat a jig of joy in her chest. Moonlight gilding Sam's hair, firelight in Frodo's, and to her great fortune she had both.

Smiling even wider, she held out her other hand, and Mr. Frodo enfolded it in both of his and gently tugged her inside.

****

 

"_As the Yule log burns warm on the hearth where we do dwell  
It brings us the promise that the year will grow well  
Grow well, grow well, grow well  
Bring us the promise the year will grow well._ "

There was much more than Rosie had been expecting. The air was warm and spicy; the room was furnished with a broad, blanket-covered pallet and a basket and a lively fire in the hearth built round a large log. Rosie gasped, realizing it was a Yule log in its own right, over half Sam's height in length, and to one side of it sat a steaming, covered pot. She turned to Mr. Frodo, lips parted in wonder, but it was Sam who said, "Well, if a thing's to be done, best do it well."

Mr. Frodo's smiling gaze slid from her face up to Sam's, and he leaned over her to kiss him, cupping his face with his free hand. For a moment, as Sam's arm tightened round Rosie's waist, as his head tilted back into Frodo's hold, as their mouths moved together, it was as if nothing had changed, as if they hadn't gone away, as if the past year had never happened.

Except that when Mr. Frodo's fingers moved between hers Rosie felt the missing one, and when he released Sam's mouth he kissed his brow gently, so gently, and took a step back. "Merry Yule, my dears," he said warmly, but from too far away. "Merry Yule, Mr. Frodo," Rosie replied, leaning forward, and his smile widened to a most welcome grin as he came back to her for the offered kiss.

Sam slipped his hand up over Rosie's shoulder to loose her cloak, and she reached back for his hand even as she leaned towards Mr. Frodo, her chest brushing his. His hand slid up from her hand, up wrist and arm and shoulder and nape and into her hair, and as he pulled away for a breath and she opened her eyes he tugged gently on her ribbon. "I've seen this before, haven't I?"

"You helped me choose them, Mr. Frodo," Sam replied, pressing behind Rosie, and she could feel that he had stripped to shirt and braces, "or I'd never have found aught fine enough." Rosie giggled, leaning back into him, as his fingers twined with Frodo's in her hair, and almost felt she could have just stood there all night, tucked warmly between them.

Almost. "'Tis nice and hot in here," Rosie said meaningfully; Mr. Frodo gave her a very poor imitation of a scandalized arched eyebrow, while Sam just pressed his face to her hair and laughed, pulling Mr. Frodo's hand with his down along her cheek and throat. "You're awful forward," he teased her, his voice so low she almost felt it more than heard it. Before her, Frodo grinned ear to ear, his fingertips pressing along her pulse, and Rosie shivered with heat. "You're the one who kissed me like he'd have me behind the Town Hall," she replied, listening to Sam's breath roughen, watching Mr. Frodo's eyes widen; Sam laughed again, lower, kissing her ear and nuzzling her hair aside to kiss her temple, beside her eye, her cheek and chin and mouth.

A gentle guiding push from Mr. Frodo, and they were sitting; Sam's hand tangled in Rosie's curls, pulling her head back towards him as he sucked at her lip, and his other hand, still twined with Frodo's, caressed the side of her throat. Mr. Frodo bent to kiss the other side of her throat, sucking harder and harder with each kiss; his other hand slipped between her back and Sam's front, and when she pressed back she could feel it working as Sam gasped into the kiss. That was when she realized she was moaning, was crying out as Mr. Frodo sucked hard at the base of her throat, and she loved it and wished he'd bite her.

Instead he pulled off, and the mark he left throbbed hot against the cool air. Mr. Frodo was trembling, they were all three trembling, Rosie realized as Sam let go her mouth, his eyes wide and dazed beneath heavy lids. "Ah, Rosie," Sam murmured, his fingers cradling the curve of her jaw, his calloused thumb stroking her lower lip, "you taste like home."

"You do," Frodo agreed, looking at her as if he saw through her face and flesh and bone to the depths of her, and Rosie blushed, feeling her cheek heating against Sam's fingers. "And so did you, always," he said to Sam, whose face turned to Mr. Frodo's as it ever did; smiling, Sam curled his other hand round Mr. Frodo's nape and kissed him, long and warm and sweet, and Rosie sighed for the sheer joy of watching them. Then she licked Sam's thumb where it lay on her lip.

Sam did not, of course, stop kissing Mr. Frodo, but his eyelashes shook on his cheek, and he pressed her lip firmly; she wrapped a hand round his wrist to push his thumb into her mouth, closing her lips round it, and Sam's gasp was muffled but certain. Frodo's laugh wasn't muffled, for he broke away from Sam though he stayed close, their noses nearly touching. "Miss Rosie," he teased, eyes bright, "You _are_ lively tonight!"

Rosie opened her mouth to tease back, but as she did she looked at Mr. Frodo, she felt Sam beside her, and suddenly she was so glad of them it ached, sharp and sweet; eyes filling, she hid her face against Frodo's chest, feeling it blood-warm beneath the loose shirt. "It's Yule," she murmured, reaching for Sam, who was right where she knew he'd be to take her hand and thread his fingers through hers.

"Yule, and the two of you, the finest gift ever." Rosie thought the words even as Sam said them, and she turned her face to look up at the fire shining in his eyes, even as his arm wound tight round her waist, even as Mr. Frodo smiled and kissed him again.

 

****

"_We stand here on the turning of the great wheel of the year.   
For every time of sadness there will come a time of cheer.   
So sing tidings of comfort and joy, comfort and joy!   
So sing tidings of comfort and joy! _"

The air was cool, but being undressed was warmer. The mulled wine was lovely, but the kisses were hotter and sweeter. Knees either side of his thighs, arms looped round his neck, Rosie kissed the long cool scar between Frodo's shoulder and his heart; she ran her tongue along it, tasting faint salt, feeling its strange smoothness disjoint with the skin around it, as she listened to his breath breaking on gasps. His fingers cradled her hips, gently, so gently, and she wished he'd press harder, determined that she and Sam would rouse him past gentleness yet.

Rosie glanced up at the tilt of Mr. Frodo's head on his sweetly curved neck, and at Sam licking along his ear; Sam opened his eye to catch hers, and winked at her as he curled his hand round her wrist, pulling her hand up. Catching his thought, she winked back, but even knowing ahead didn't restrain a shudder of pleasure when Sam sucked her first two fingers into his mouth, winding his tongue round them. Her face still pressed to Frodo's shoulder, Rosie moaned, and he felt it and quivered beneath her mouth and moaned as well; the echo building on itself was so much, too much, it pressed her eyes shut and left her gasping as Sam sucked her fingers, as Mr. Frodo's hands slid to the small of her back to press her closer. Sam licked the pulse of her wrist, and she whimpered, pushing her face against Mr. Frodo, trying to keep her wits from flying apart.

Sam gently pushed her hand back and down, and Rosie slid her face up to Mr. Frodo's throat as she took a steadying breath and tucked that hand between them. She kissed his throat, where he'd always liked it, but what made him jump and give a pleased little groan was her wet hand wrapping round him; it was a puzzle, but Rosie was one to go with what worked, and anyway she had to raise her head to look down at Sam's hands on Mr. Frodo's chest, stroking and petting and pinching, at her hand pressed between their bellies by the arch of his back, wrapped round his prick. And ah, the feel of him, velvet soft over hard heat. She squeezed a little, rubbing the pad of her thumb over the head, and smiled to hear Mr. Frodo's moan, loud even muffled in Sam's kiss; Sam turned one hand over to catch her breast, pressing her nipple with his thumb, and Rosie gasped a giggle as her brow fell to Frodo's shoulder, as his hands pressed a better firmness on their way up her back. She bit her lip to concentrate on stroking him, smiling when Mr. Frodo groaned and clutched her nape, his hand clenching and loosening in the same rhythm she was setting.

It was the rhythm of a carol, she realized, just catching herself from singing; he pulled her in tight, and her breasts squashed between their bodies, her nipples tingling as their rhythm rubbed them over his chest. Striving not to let her wits melt in the rising heat, Rosie trailed her lips along Mr. Frodo's throat to suck a kiss below his jaw, and his tremble and hiss and groaned "yes" echoed low in her belly behind her stroking hand, shaking the happiness and the song loose so that she hummed against his skin; before she could catch herself, he groaned again, his hand winding into her curls, and she smiled against his skin and kept humming.

Sam's fingertips traced over the curve of her brow and cheek, and Rosie tilted her head against the push of Mr. Frodo's hand, turning towards those fingers as they stroked her lips and slid between them. She couldn't see his face but she knew what he was about; she sucked hard on his fingers, tasting faint wine sweetness, calluses and Sam, twining her tongue round them till she heard Sam moan low and drawn out, and she would have smiled if she could. He pulled back, the other fingers skimming her jaw, and she laid her other hand on his shoulder, the better to feel what she couldn't see.

And what she could feel, as Mr. Frodo arched further, shaking like a willow in high wind, his eyelids fluttering as he moaned, "Sam, ah, yes, there..."

"Have you, Mr. Frodo, I have you," Sam murmured, voice muffled in Frodo's hair, and Rosie stroked and clung and watched, watched Sam's eyes flutter closed and Mr. Frodo's lids press shut as his face tightened, as she felt Sam's shoulder rolling with the counterpoint rhythm to her hand, as they moved together, heartstoppingly beautiful. Mr. Frodo gasped, and his eyes flew open, wide and unseeing, and Rosie thought absently, 'why, he looks surprised!' even as she felt him clutch her hair, felt him tense and tremble and peak in her hand, seeming almost to cease breathing for a long moment.

His eyes fell shut, and he turned his face inward towards Sam's neck as he took a ragged breath and another, his hands slipping from Rosie's hair and sliding down her back, her skin tingling in their wake. Sam kissed Frodo's brow and winked at Rosie, and she managed a shaky smile back, though all her mouth wanted to do was to moan; Sam reached out to cup her cheek, and the touch made Rosie quiver top to toe as she felt how roused she was, all her skin at once damp and afire.

Mr. Frodo took a great gasping breath, and sighed, and lifted his head; when he opened his eyes they were unshadowed, and his smile was content. "Ah, Rosie," he breathed, and she smiled at him a little more steadily, unwinding her fingers as she sat back on his knees. He gave a little tremble at that, eyelids drooping and raising again, and she was about to wipe her hand when he caught her wrist and pulled it up; Sam wrapped his own larger hand round Mr. Frodo's on her arm, but she didn't even have time to feel their hands together on her skin before Sam sucked her fingers into his mouth while Frodo licked her hand, slow and hot, up over the ball of her thumb and her palm.

Rosie's eyes went wide as Sam ran the tip of his tongue between her fingers and the skin there fairly throbbed, as Frodo sucked her thumb like he could make it peak. Sam's eyes were closed, but Mr. Frodo's were open, bright and knowing, watching Rosie's face as the heat and feeling of their mouths on her hand surged up her arm and through her veins to haze her head and curl her toes and melt her bones like wax, till her head rolled back on her neck, till her spine unstrung and only Mr. Frodo's arm round her waist held her up. Mr. Frodo shifted his knee between Rosie's, pressing her with his thigh, pushing a moan out of her; he pulled off her thumb with a wet pop and asked softly, "Rosie, what would you like?" and she couldn't even think to answer, her wits long since melted away. Sam let go her fingers only to lick circles in her palm, and Mr. Frodo rocked his thigh into her; Rosie shuddered all over, slumping forward to lie against Mr. Frodo's chest, her fevered brow wet on his cool shoulder, her free hand clutching Sam's arm. "Rosie," Frodo murmured, amusement glinting in his voice, his breath tickling her ear. "What would you like?" he asked again, and she could only moan in reply; he pressed his teeth to the point of her ear, and the moan flared to a scream.

"Now, ah, Mr. Frodo," Sam admonished, half gasping himself, "now if a hobbit would bring another to such a pitch as she can't even talk, then go asking her questions, 'twould be you, my wild sir." Frodo chuckled, breath hot and cool at once over Rosie's wet throbbing eartip, and bit along the curve of her ear, and she helplessly screamed again, feeling herself sliding wetly along his thigh. "But look at her like this, Sam," Mr. Frodo said, soft and clear through Rosie's squeaks as he laid a bite between each word. "Isn't she beautiful?"

"That she is," Sam said warmly; Rosie hadn't thought she could grow any hotter, but her cheeks burned. It was an old game between them on festival nights, for two of them to talk about the third when they were too far gone to reply, but that didn't make it any less delightful, or less embarrassing. "I--ah---" Rosie attempted, her words shading to a cry as Sam mouthed the heel of her hand, sucking it as his hand slid up her nerve-scorched, boneless arm to press her shoulder and catch her nape and draw her over for a kiss. Mr. Frodo took advantage of her bared neck to suck a mark to match the one he'd left earlier, which throbbed in sympathy, and Rosie cried out into Sam's kiss. The two of them were going to kill her, send her up in the flames of Yule like a herb-charm, and she'd die happy...

"Sam," Rosie heard herself gasp over his lips, still brushing hers so that she could feel his smile, and she felt Mr. Frodo's against her neck. "See, Sam?" he said, kissing beneath her ear. "She can still talk, we have work to do." Sam's chuckle was muffled, Rosie could hear them kissing somewhere closer than the fire's pop and further than the pound of her heart. Sam's hand curved round her waist, holding her, and Mr. Frodo slipped out from between them, neat as a ring-dance for all that Rosie was no help as far gone as she was, her limbs able only to shake and feel; she hardly had a moment to chide herself for it, though, before Sam lifted her, both hands on her waist, and pulled her down onto him. The feel of it cracked her spine like a whip, all the way up, flinging her head back and a cry from her throat; Rosie tipped backwards, white flashes going off behind her eyelids, her hands spasming on Sam's shoulders, but Mr. Frodo was there to catch her.

"Yes," Frodo murmured into her ear, kissing the side of her face, her cheek, her chin; "Rosie," Sam groaned, his hands tightening on her waist, bouncing her, and she strove to catch his rhythm and heard a carol's beat in her head. Frodo rose up on his knees, pushing Rosie tight against Sam all along their fronts, his curly hair scraping little tingles over her belly and breasts and nipples; they kissed over her shoulder, and her eyes flew open for one glimpse of their two heads together before she couldn't even see anymore because her peak hit, pressing her face tight to Sam's shoulder.

Sam stilled and grunted, and Rosie realized as she came back to herself that she was biting him. She pried her teeth out of his shoulder and kissed the mark she'd left, and he chuckled breathily; she pushed up heavy eyelids, and his eyes were dark and warm as summer midnight, the firelight turned to sunlight in his hair for all that it was Yule. "Hold tight, lass," Sam said, and she nodded, winding her legs round his waist; Frodo unpeeled from her back, an arm round each of them, and Sam leaned forward, holding himself on his hands as he laid them both down.

The movement made them shift, which made them both moan; Rosie bucked against Sam to hear that moan again, and how he felt within her. Mr. Frodo kissed her face, kissed Sam's, and when she reached for his hand he tangled their fingers and pressed their joined hands down against the pallet so that the ticking crackled. Rosie gasped and squirmed; Sam still hovered over her, holding himself up, and she wanted to feel him against her, wanted Mr. Frodo to hold both her hands, wanted them both so _much_. She turned her head and kissed what of Mr. Frodo she could reach, that being his knee; he chuckled and smiled at her and softly said, "ah, Rosie." He shifted, pulling that knee out of her reach, but made up for it by rising up on his knees to catch her other hand and press it down, leaning forward over her, and oh the firelight and shadow over his ribs and flanks and thighs, and Sam's arms shook to either side of her as Mr. Frodo murmured, "Sam."

"Frodo," Sam gasped, and they were kissing again, but Rosie could hardly spare thought to watch them, because Sam began to _move_. She didn't know if her eyes were open or shut; she didn't know if she wept or screamed or cried out how she loved them both. She clutched Mr. Frodo's hands and pulled against them, arching up to Sam till he dropped to her; she writhed against him as he pressed her down, kissing her mouth and throat and breasts, his moans warm over the damp marks of his mouth on her skin. She heard Mr. Frodo's voice but not his words, but she didn't need to his hear his words to know them, as she screamed and kicked her heels against the air and peaked, clenching around Sam, pleasure and fire surging through her veins. His face buried in her hair, Sam sobbed her name, sliding his hands beneath her back to clutch her rump and pull her hard against him and drive into her and peak, shaking all over, and she moaned and turned her face to his and peaked again just from the feel of him, holding her so tightly, his trembling shaking her all through.

Rosie drifted back to reality to feel herself glowing like a coal, if slightly crushed. Sam lay hot and gasping and limp on her, his face pressed to the side of hers, and Mr. Frodo held her hands tightly as he leaned over the heap of them, murmuring. Rosie caught the word "lovely", and it sent a little shiver of pleasure through her. Unfortunately, that shook loose a cough, which made Sam get his elbows beneath himself with a cry of dismay; before she could coax her weary voice to words he rolled off her, and the cool weightless air whisked away the heat he'd covered her with. Mr. Frodo squeezed her hands and released them; Rosie wanted to reach for Sam, but her arms barely consented to drag themselves down to her chest and her body felt heavy as lead, so she contented herself with dropping a hand against his still-heaving chest. Sam dropped his hand on hers, and their hands folded round each other.

Mr. Frodo stroked the damp hair off both their brows, and kissed Sam's. "You are both so beautiful," he said, a smile in his voice, and Rosie smiled for reply as he laid a kiss to her brow.

****

"_Oh the rising of the sun,  
The running of the deer.  
All merry folk arise and sing  
To greet the dawning year._"

It was still dark, the only light as yet the ruddy gold of the fire. Rosie had not realized she'd fallen asleep till she woke, head tucked beneath Sam's chin; he lay on his side, arm draped over her middle, feet tucked over and between hers. No, that was three feet, and the fur on the middle one felt softer beneath her foot; when she opened her eyes Mr. Frodo lay tucked to Sam's back, his head propped on one hand and his foot tucked into the tangle, and he smiled when he saw her awake.

Rosie smiled back. Then she grinned, and Mr. Frodo grinned, and for the moment one almost might have thought him no older than she and Sam. But when he turned to sit up fully the long curving scar on his back caught the firelight, and she winced before she could stop herself, wondering once more what cruel turn to their adventure had laid it there.

Mr. Frodo turned towards her again, and she pulled her face straight before he could catch her looking. He was here, and Sam was here, they were both alive and warm and with her now as the Sun rounded the curve of the year to return to them all, and no shadow from the past would darken that. As if he heard her thought Sam opened his eyes and smiled at her, his hand sliding up between her breasts to lie over her full heart. "How do ye, Rosie?" he asked.

The reply she gave surprised her, but it was true. "I feel I could sing," she said, and Sam leaned closer to kiss her. "Then, sing."

Rosie flushed. "With you making those great eyes at me?" Mr. Frodo laughed merrily, and Sam just smiled. So, there being nothing for it, she sat up, coughed and closed her eyes, and sang the first carol that came to her, and though she'd just woken her voice was reasonably sweet. "The holly and the ivy/ When they are both full grown/ Of all the trees that are in the wood/The holly bears the crown."

When Rosie opened her eyes, Mr. Frodo had his hand on Sam's shoulder, covered by Sam's hand, and they both looked at her so that she wanted to weep and dance and kiss them both. "Well chosen," Frodo said, as Sam reached for her hand, and they all three began to sing together, to sing the new year in.

"_The holly bears a prickle  
As sharp as any thorn  
And we shall bear our song of hope  
This shining Yuletide morn._"

**Author's Note:**

> Author's note on carol attributions: Of the Yule carols I used in this, only the first one is my work (and I only wrote the snippet seen here). The title is from "Angels We Have Heard on High", which is a Christmas carol, but hey. In order, the other carols are: "Yrminsul ", a pre-fifteenth-century German carol; "The Holiest Light ", from the Stone Creek Grove songbook; "Now Make You Merry, Revelers" by Kimber Camacho ; "The Holly and the Ivy" variant by Karen Deal Robinson; and "The Holly and the Ivy", variant by Hilda Marshall. All of them can be found using Google, if you want the complete lyrics.


End file.
